Italian authorities put the mayor of Venice under house arrest on Wednesday and issued warrants for more than 30 people for suspected corruption over a 5-billion-euro, about $6.8-billion, flood barrier project, the latest scandal to engulf Italian politics, according to The Associated Press.
The Moses project, designed to save the famed canal city from sinking into the lagoon it is built on, was first mooted back in 1966 but construction did not start until 2004, due to wrangling over its design, funding and environmental impact, the AP reported.
In a statement, Venice prosecutors said they had issued 25 jail warrants and 10 for house arrest, on allegations of corruption, illicit party financing and tax fraud, according to the AP.
Police sources said Venice's mayor, Giorgio Orsoni, was among those placed under house arrest, the AP reported.
Police carried out the prosecutors' orders in the early hours of Wednesday morning, the statement said, and seized assets worth around 40 million euros, or $54.49 million, according to the AP.
Giancarlo Galan, a two-time minister and prominent official in Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia party and former governor of the Veneto region, was also among the accused, the AP reported. Galan issued a statement denying any wrongdoing and said he wanted to speak to prosecutors to clear his name.
A spokesman and lawyers for Orsoni did not respond to phone calls requesting comment, according to the AP. Italian media quoted his lawyers as saying the accusations were "hardly credible".
As a member of parliament, Galan cannot be arrested unless parliament votes to lift his immunity, the AP reported.
The investigation into hidden funds created by companies involved in Moses, the first of whose barriers was unveiled last year, and other projects in the Veneto region began in 2009, according to the AP.
"As the investigation continued, it emerged that most of these funds were used to buy political power ... and to bribe senior public officials," the prosecutor's' statement said, the AP reported.
